Chapter 27, folks!
I'll get right to the reviews.
To Tuangaming, glad you're enjoying the story. We still got plenty to go.
To MadDogLucario96, yep, Taichi and Ross went the whole nine yards with the Hall & Oates act.
Anyways, let's get on with it. After this, we're half-way through the story... of course.. we know the adventure won't truly end there...
Chapter 27: Radiant Wings! Garudamon!
Server Continent, Digital World. A-Day+97. Afternoon.
P.O.V. – Ross McGlathery
After we had left TonosamaGekomon's castle, we headed towards the rally point at the base of one of the larger mountains that was in the nearby range via the water. As decided earlier, Mimi, Palmon, Gigimon and myself were riding in the swan boat while Jou, Gomamon, Koromon and Taichi were riding on a raft of Gomamon's Flying Fishes. It took most of the afternoon but we finally could see the shore at base of the mountain, which thank goodness we took the water route, we'd probably not make it before dark if we walked.
"All right, we're here!" Taichi informed us as we started to get off our respective transports.
"Ugh… I'm never getting the smell of seafood out of my clothes." moaned Jou.
"All this peddling has made me exhausted." I groaned. Taichi walked to the side of the swan after I got out.
"Come on, princess!" He said to Mimi.
"Don't call me a princess!"
"I'm just kidding!" He laughed.
"Hey!" A voice shouted from the east. We turned to see coming down the route was Yamato, Tsunomon, Takeru, Patamon, Koushiro and Mochimon.
"It's Yamato!" Jou cheered as the others rejoined us.
"You've turned smaller since I last saw you." Palmon informed the four Baby-Level Digimon.
"Leave us alone!" They shouted. Well, it was great we were all back together again, but we're still missing one person.
"Where's Sora?" Taichi asked. Uh oh.
"We didn't see her." Yamato told us.
"I see… Where could she have gone?"
"I…" Mimi spoke up. "I think I might have seen her." We all turned our attention to her.
"Where?"
"At the Gekomon's palace. But… it might have been a dream… It's actually because of that dream that I stopped my selfishness."
"So that's what happened." Jou said.
"Actually, it wasn't a dream." I confessed.
"Huh?" They were all were confused.
"I have a confession. I know where Sora is."
"Where?" Taichi questioned.
"When PicoDevimon tried to feed us those mushrooms, I lied about that."
"But I thought you remembered something Palmon said about the mushrooms that made you realized they were bad." Koromon remembered.
"No, that was a lie. I didn't know until Sora said from the bushes. She was hiding and didn't want to be found but… I ended up tackling her, exposing the fact that she was shadowing us."
"So, why then hasn't Sora-san come to us?" Takeru asked.
"I don't know. I tried to get her to join us, but she wouldn't follow, I assumed that she wanted to be alone or something. I wasn't too worried, one, had to deal with the mushrooms and two, she still had Piyomon."
"There's no use thinking about why she's done it. We're not her." Yamato dismissed our wondering of Sora's reasons before he looked at his Digivice, some of the rest of us followed suit and saw on the map that Sora's Digivice was not too far ahead of us. "We'll have to catch her first."
"This is like playing hide-and-seek." Taichi rationalized.
"It's coming from the north." Koushiro gave us a direction. We followed along to hopefully find Sora.
P.O.V. – Third Person
Deep in the dark mountains, there resided a sinister castle. It looked like a dark side version of the Abbey of Monte Cassino in Italy. This was the castle of the villainous Vamdemon that PicoDevimon served. And things were not going well for the small bat. His continual failures had all but jeopardized the plans his master had established. His screams could be heard far outside the castle walls as fell down the stairs in the main chambers. Walking down the steps after him was the Digimon known as Vamdemon. He was a vampire with a long black cape, blonde hair, pale skin with a red mask covering his eyes, and a dark blue outfit similar to an old Eastern European count.
"I've grown quite tired of your incompetence."
"P-Please forgive me… Vamdemon-sama…!"
"Courage, Honor, Hope, Friendship… The children's Crests have regained their light one after the other."
"I am most ashamed for my failures! B-But, Vamdemon-sama! Not all of the Crests have activated yet!" The small bat fluttered his wings and activated a portal that showed Sora and Piyomon. "Especially this girl. Her Crest of Love will never glow! The truth is, it's because I've given her some advice. The other seven should be gathering by her side any time now. If we wait for that… we will crush the children with one swift stroke!" Vamdemon paused as he considered the bat's plan.
"When that time comes, call for me. I'll personally send those children straight to Hell." He soon walked away.
"Yes, sir!"
P.O.V. – Taichi Yagami
"Hey! Sora!" I yelled out. It was getting close to night and there still was no sign of her, despite what the Digivice was saying.
"Sora-san!" Koushiro called.
"Sora! Come on out!" Ross shouted.
"Hey… Let's stop here for today and find some place to rest. It's too dangerous to wander around in the dark." suggested Jou as he sounded pretty tired.
"I'm tired…" Mimi dropped to her knees. Understandable, she had been resting comfortably in a castle for the past couple of weeks and wasn't back to her full traveling strength yet.
"But she should be around here." insisted Yamato. Another quick look of our Digivices showed that we were almost on top of Sora. Patamon suddenly made a noise.
"What's wrong?" Takeru asked.
"I can hear something."
"Maybe it's Sora-san!"
We all became quite and listened. The sounds of the local ambience like bugs and the like could be heard before we heard a strange buzzing noise. Our answered burst through the trees in the form of a fairly large bee.
"It's Flymon!" Koromon informed. He turned back around and started to launch stingers at us forcing us to move for cover. Koushiro opened up his laptop as he took refuge behind a tree.
"I can bring up his stats by using the Digimon Analyzer that Gennai-san sent me. Here it is!" We gathered by him to see the screen. "Flymon. An Insect Digimon. Adult Level. He's a virus type." Virus type? Is that something like Pocket Monsters with type advantages, like the rock, paper, scissors advantage with Fire, Water, and Grass? "His special attack, Deadly Sting, sprays poison stingers. Poison stingers?!" We ran as the bug fired another stinger that hit a tree. If we hadn't move, it would've impaled Koushiro. The bee launched more stingers that just kept barely missing us; if we don't do something quick, someone's gonna get killed by one of those.
"Taichi!" "Yamato!" "Ross!" Our respective Digimon called out. "Koromon, evolve! AGUMON!" "Tsunomon, evolve! GABUMON!" "Gigimon, evolve! GUILMON!"
"Agumon!" "Gabumon!" "Guilmon!" We said to them as they launched a counter-attack.
"Baby Flame!" "Petit Fire!" "Fireball!" Flymon moved so fast that he simply dodged all three of the attacks.
"Oh no! Flymon is too fast!" Mochimon feared.
"Marching Fishes!" "Poison Ivy!" Both Palmon and Gomamon tried their own attack but were unsuccessful. Flymon just merely avoided them and turned to launch more of his stingers.
All of a sudden, a powerful roar filled the skies in the form of Birdramon flying above the jungle canopy towards our position. Looks like Sora was still helping out, even if she wouldn't make an appearance.
"It's Birdramon!" Mochimon shouted.
"Meteor Wing!" Birdramon released her wave of fiery projectiles that ended up roasting the bee completely and sending what's left of him to burn on the jungle floor.
"Since Birdramon is here… Sora!" I ran directly after Birdramon.
"Move it!" Ross ordered.
"Taichi, wait for me!" I heard Agumon cry from behind.
"Me too!" Gabumon said so that meant both him and Yamato were following along.
"I'm coming too!" Takeru insisted.
"Takeru, don't leave me behind!" Patamon panicked.
After a few minutes of running towards a creek, I thought I caught a glimpse of Sora.
"Wait, Sora!" I called. I had a feeling I wasn't going to keep up with her following her the same way so I cut through some bushes and lo and behold, it payed off because I hopped out right in front of Sora's path. "Sora!" I panted out of breath. She quickly tried to turn around but found her path blocked by Ross who was right behind her.
"Sorry, Sora… out of time." He said. Must have said the same thing last night or something. Yamato then soon caught up with the three of us.
"Why are you running away?" Yamato asked. Ross said it was something about being alone with her thoughts or something, but who really knows but her.
"Explain yourself, Sora!" I demanded… well, lightly demanded. She did nothing but looked down to the ground with a sad look on her face as Takeru and the rest of our Digimon now arrived.
"Sora…" Yamato muttered.
"Sora-san, do you… hate us now?" Takeru asked.
"No…" She shook her head. "That's not it…" Piyomon dropped from the trees to land right next to her.
"Sora. Why don't you tell them?" Sora sighed before she started to speak again.
"When Piyomon and I… left that night to look for Taichi and Ross… I… I saw them. I saw PicoDevimon talking to someone."
"What were they talking about?" Takeru asked once more.
"Our Crests."
"Our Crests?" I questioned.
"Yes. Each of our Crests has a different meaning. For example, you have the Crest of Courage, Taichi."
"Crest of Courage?" Me, courageous? Well, there was the time where I gathered my courage to get through that electrical fence to save Sora that day, and the charging towards Etemon was also pretty courageous, I think. "I see. So that's why my Crest glowed back then!"
"Yamato-kun, yours is the Crest of Friendship."
"Friendship."
"How about me, Sora?" Ross asked.
"Yours fits you pretty well. You possess the Crest of Honor, Ross."
"Honor?" Well, I guess honoring promises and preforming some honorable actions like charging to certain doom to save others is about as honorable as it gets. Fits for a guy who wants to be a Marine.
"Than what about mine?" Takeru questioned.
"Yours is the Crest of Hope."
"The Crest of Hope!" The young boy looked towards Patamon.
"Koushiro-kun has the Crest of Knowledge." Ha, no real surprised there. "Jou-senpai has the Crest of Sincerity." Well, the guy is pretty sincere about his words and actions so I guess that's a fit for him. "Mimi-chan has the Crest of Purity." Well, her actions before weren't pure but after last night, she's put a stop to much of her selfishness. "And mine is…" She hesitated for a moment. "The Crest of Love."
"Love fits you perfectly, Sora." I complemented. Her reaction was not something any of us expected.
"No it doesn't!" She shouted at me. "It doesn't fit me at all!"
"B-But… You always think about the others and…"
"I don't care about the others! You don't… You don't know what I'm really like, so stop talking as if you do!" Woah. There are some things she is really airing out. The angry look on her face quickly vanished into one of shame. "I'm sorry."
"Wh-What's wrong?"
"My Crest… It won't glow. Because I don't have any love." She quickly sat down next to the tree and buried her face in her legs.
"What do you mean, you don't have any love?" Takeru was confused about that, as well as the rest of us.
"I don't understand this at all! Man, girls are so much trouble." I kid.
"You won't be saying that in a few years, I guarantee that, Taichi." Ross joked.
"Don't make fun of her, you two." Yamato told us. Ross put his hands up as if he was innocent or saying 'I wasn't making fun of her, I was making fun of him.'
"I'm just kidding!" I defended.
"PicoDevimon told me." She put her head back up again. "He caught us after he finished his conversation with this mysterious master of his. He said he pitied me. That I was raised without knowing any real love. That it was beyond question that my Crest will never glow."
"Don't be stupid!" I told her. "PicoDevimon was obviously lying!"
"Yeah, why for a second would you believe a word that rat said?" added Ross.
"No…" Sora muttered. "He wasn't lying." Huh? "It happened… back when I was on the girls' soccer team…" Oh no. I know what she talking about now.
Sora's home life… is complicated to say the least. Her father, Haruhiko Takenouchi, is almost never around. The man is a university professor at one of the universities in Tokyo in the field of anthropology; with his research into finding facts about animal spirts. He travels all around Japan and sometimes out of the country for it as well as speaking at universities. In fact, I think he's up north in Sapporo at this very moment, or at least, on August 1st according to Sora two weeks ago. His wife, Toshiko, whom he met while in Kyoto and later married, is well, the cause of Sora's feelings. Her mother is a teacher of Ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arranging; actually she's a Grand Master and the next in a long line of flower arranging Grand Masters in her family. And well, she has hopes for Sora to continue that line, much to Sora's resentment. Ross has an idea, and I'm inclined to agree with it; is that Sora's tomboyish attitude stems as a form of rebellion to her mother.
"I was their ace striker." Sora continued her story. "Our team had a really big game that day and that I need to go. My mom complained that I needed to lower my voice or the flowers would wilt. I tried to tell her the importance of the game but she just pointed out the injury to my leg. It wasn't that bad, okay, bandages were still on it, but it was fine! It was nothing! She then said she wanted me to quit soccer. Something about not learning to sit gracefully on my heels or something. That wasn't happening. I care more about soccer than some stupid flowers. And she's the biggest hypocrite in the world; she played tennis in high school! She then questioned how I could be her daughter, which I yelled at her 'Why can't you understand?!' before I ran off.
"Sora, your house is famous for traditional flower arrangement, isn't it?" I reminded more to quickly inform Yamato, Takeru and the Digimon about what was going on with Sora's home life.
"Yeah. My family is ie-moto."
"What's an 'ie-moto'?" Takeru asked.
"It means her mother is a master who teaches flower arranging." Ross said.
"In the end, we lost horribly from that game. I couldn't stay in that club anymore. My mom doesn't see me as anything beyond the daughter of a flower arrangement school! She thinks our reputation as an ie-moto is more important that I am! That's the kind of woman she is!"
"So. Even if I am raised without love, there's nothing I can do about that!" She yelled as she got up and looked like she was planning on throwing the Crest in her hand.
"Stop it, Sora!" I quickly grabbed her arm.
"Let go of me!"
"Weather that's true or not, you can't believe in what PicoDevimon said!" Tears began to fill in Sora's eyes before she just broke down and cried. "Hey, don't cry! Hey, Ross, Yamato… What should I do?"
"Be a shoulder for her to cry on." Ross told me. What? Well, okay. I walked up to Sora and patted her on the back. She suddenly grabbed me and buried herself in my shoulder.
"How did you know?" Yamato asked.
"Mimi-kun did the same thing to me last night. If Sora wants to cry, then let her get it all out."
"Ross is really mature." Agumon claimed.
"More than Taichi, that's for sure." Gabumon said. Hey!
"I think that stems more from his father; sounds like some sort of advice he gave at some time." Guilmon theorized. Well, that's true, Ross always does claim the things he knows about girls comes from his dad.
"Sora-san…" Takeru walked up and tugged on her shirt. "Thank you." Sora stopped her crying when she heard that. "You're the one who told us not to eat the mushrooms, right?"
"We knew PicoDevimon was plotting something so we followed him secretly." Piyomon explained. "Also when Yamato and Jou were working in Digitamamon's restaurant… we replaced a brick with those potatoes that were outside that PicoDevimon tried to sabotage."
"I didn't know." Yamato said.
"You didn't have to hide from us." I told her.
"Sora wanted to be alone." Piyomon informed.
"See? I was right." Ross looked pretty proud as he said that.
"But…" Piyomon spoke up again. "She couldn't just leave the rest of you completely. Understand her, okay?" We all nodded.
"I really like you, Sora-san." Takeru admitted. "So don't leave anymore, okay? I don't like it when my family… I mean, when everyone becomes separated." I think he slipped with his words, but it's kinda nice to think our gang is one large dysfunctional family.
"Takeru-kun…" Sora had tears in her eyes again. "Okay, I won't." She wiped them away. "I'm sorry."
"Hey!" We heard Jou call out as the rest of the gang finally rejoined us.
"Hey! What took you so long?" I questioned.
"Jou-senpai took his time after falling into the river." Mimi said to Jou's embarrassment.
"Mimi-kun, you kept sitting down and complaining about how tired and hungry you were!"
P.O.V. – Third Person
While the children had reunited with each other, they were unaware that their movements were being watched by PicoDevimon.
"They're all here. I must inform Vamdemon-sama of this right away." He quickly flew away from the group and made contact with his dark master. Back at the castle, a stone gate opened up revealing a large black dragon with four glowing red eyes pulling a stagecoach behind it. A strange red and white cloaked creature was the driver of the carriage as it flew across the night sky. Vamdemon was about to make his terrifying appearance to the children.
At the same time, the children had all fallen asleep around the campfire they had set up. The fact that they didn't have anyone on watch made them sadly easy targets for the nearby PicoDevimon.
"They're all sleeping deeply." He pulled out a very large version of one his Pico Darts. "I'll pick off a few of them before Vamdemon-sama arrives." Thankfully, Piyomon's good hearing helped again as she woke up just in time to see the small bat. "Pico Darts!"
"Sora, look out!" She placed her body in front of Sora's and took the large syringe into her side.
P.O.V. – Sora Takenouchi
I was quickly woken up by Piyomon, only to find she had been stabbed by a very large syringe!
"Piyomon!" I cried, pulling the syringe out of her. "Piyomon! Hang in there! Piyomon!"
"Sora… I'll protect you…" She moaned in pain.
"Piyomon!"
"What? What's wrong?" Taichi asked as he woke up.
"It's PicoDevimon!" Takeru shouted. The bat panicked and quickly fled the scene. As soon as he left, the full moon in the sky was starting to be blocked by a very thick black cloud. The whole area turned black with the only light being our campfire. A moment later, the sky cleared, revealing the moon had turned blood red and a large creature carrying a stagecoach was flying in our direction.
"Wha… What's that?" stuttered Taichi. The back of the stagecoach opened up and a shiny coffin fell out from it. It then burst opened to reveal a dark creature concealed in a black cape who landed on the ground about a good five hundred meters ahead of us.
"Chosen Children." The being spoke in a very sinister voice, one that I suddenly remembered.
"That's him!" I pointed. "He's the guy PicoDevimon was talking to!"
"Don't call him by such rude terms!" PicoDevimon was quick to defend his dark master. "This is Vamdemon-sama!"
"Vamdemon?" Taichi questioned.
"Vamdemon-sama!" The said Digimon just laughed.
"Your journey ends here. Night Raid!" He opened up his cape to reveal he was a large vampire and a swarm of dark bats were summoned from his cape that was revealed to be blood red on the inside. The bats flew right towards us but our Digimon wasn't going to let those bats harm us.
"Let's go, guys!" Agumon ordered.
"Baby Flame!" "Petit Fire!" "Fireball!" "Mochimon, evolve! TENTOMON!" "Petit Thunder!" "Air Shot!" The attacks provided a wall of protective fire but the bats refused to let up their attack.
"They just keep coming!" Koushiro yelled. A few of them got through and started to poke at Mimi and Jou.
"Mimi!" Palmon called out. "Palmon, evolve! TOGEMON! Everyone, get down! Chiku-Chiku Bang Bang!" Togemon's wave of needles flew out and struck down many of the evil bats.
"Now! Gomamon, evolve! IKKAKUMON! Harpoon Vulcan!" The missiles that he launched flew directly towards the vampire who did nothing but take them head on.
"You got him!" Jou cheered.
"Way too early to celebrate, Jou-san." Ross reminded. Out of the smoke came an unscathed Vamdemon flying in the air.
"You'd be right." He taunted. "Bloody Stream!" A red whip of energy appeared in his hands and struck both Togemon and Ikkakumon down. He then proceeded to wipe out the other Digimon all the while laughing maniacally.
"Taichi… He's… strong…" Agumon uttered.
"No way!" Taichi panicked. We were in deep trouble now.
"I have to go…" Piyomon muttered in my arms. "I'm the only one left…" What? She's barely awake!
"You can't! How do you plan on attacking him with your wounds?"
"Please understand, Sora… I have to go!" She started to struggle in my arms as she tried to get away from me.
"You can't!"
"Let go!"
"No! You can't go!"
"Why can't you understand?!" What? Did she say…?
"Why can't you understand?!" Those were the exact same words I said to my mother the day of the big game. Mom! Oh, I'm such a fool! She was really… She was really thinking about me first… Piyomon used my distracted attention to get away from my arms.
"Piyomon, evolve! BIRDRAMON!"
Birdramon flew directly towards the vampire Digimon and attacked with little success.
"Meteor Wing!"
"Bloody Steam!" His attack hit her square in her chest.
"Birdramon!" I screamed as I ran towards her. My heart was breaking to see her fall, and probably will be destroyed by that evil monster. Only now do I realize…
That I have love in my life!
"BIRDRAMON!" To my utter shock, my Crest finally glowed and my Digivice turned red with orange buttons which shot out a light that hit my Crest and went towards Birdramon.
"Birdramon, super-evolve! GARUDAMON!" Garudamon was a giant beast-man, or woman in her case, creature that looked somewhat Native American in nature. She possessed a metal mask over her head and two titanic wings.
"Wh-What is that light?" Vamdemon shouted. Garudamon turned around and picked me up in her large hands.
"Sora, your love…" She said. "I felt so much of it!" I almost had to cry.
"Piyomon… You look so cool!"
"Damn it!" Vamdemon cursed. "The Crest of Love just had to activate at the most crucial moment!"
"I will protect Sora!" declared the large bird woman. She flew high in the sky while keeping a strong hold on me. "Shadow Wing!" Her wings burned with fire before they launched an attack in the shape of a phoenix towards the evil vampire.
"Night Raid!" He used his bats as a shield to hold back the attack which caused a bright blinding light.
"Come, let's run while we still can!" Garudamon said to the others as she picked them up as well and used the blinding light as a distraction to escape. We escaped past the mountains as the sun began to rise over them.
Server Continent, Digital World. A-Day+98. Early Morning.
P.O.V. – Ross McGlathery
We thankfully managed to escape from the terrible clutches of Vamdemon, and thank God Almighty for that eleventh-hour evolution because we really were up a creek at that moment. We all managed to relax by a nearby stream, far from the mountains where Vamdemon came from.
"See?" Taichi spoke. "There was nothing to worry about. Your Crest glowed after all."
"Before I know what I was doing… I was acting just like my mom."
"Sora…" Pyocomon said.
"That's when I understood… My mom loved me all along." We all have our sort of problems with our folks and we feel like they just like to make our lives miserable, but they do truly care for us. Maybe now, if we get back home, things will be better between Sora and her mother.
"I felt it too! I felt your love!"
"I'm sorry about before."
"I'm glad you're back to your usual self!"
"I want Sora's love too." Taichi joked I think? Or did he just admit he has a crush on her?
"Taichi, you dummy! What do you think you're saying?!" questioned Jou.
"Huh? Jou-san, your face is red." Takeru pointed out.
"Jou-senpai!" Mimi walked up next to him with something in her hand. "Shall I give you my love?" What!? "Here you go." She filled his hands with acorns. Wait; was that a reference to Peter Pan?
"Mimi-kun… you know…" Jou just moaned making us all laugh. Our laughing stopped when we heard an ominous sound and turned to see a familiar dark cloud floating in the sky before hearing a terrifying laugh.
"That voice!" Sora shouted.
"Chosen Children. With only the power of eight, you cannot thwart the might of our evil powers." Vamdemon threatened, even if he wasn't actually here in person. What exactly did he mean by 'only the power of eight'?
The next few days, we'd get that answer, and things will really get kicked up a notch…
And that was Chapter 27.
Okay, now that you know Ross' Crest, here's where it is so you know what it looks like. Go to Imgur and after the backslash behind .com, type in NWYB9II (Those are I's, not 1's) The Crest was designed by HetalianNation on DeviantArt that I asked for permission and he gave it. It can also be found on DeviantArt under his profile with the picture labeled Digimon Crests and it's the first one in the second row.
Anyways, this is the last chapter for you to listen to the song 'I wish!', the next one will be 'Keep on!'.
Take care everyone, I'll see you on the 30th.
"Push the button, Frank."
